1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to spoken dialog systems and more specifically to a system and method of dynamically building conversational systems for interfacing with databases.
2. Introduction
As the world-wide web (WWW) evolves, user interaction with the computer to provide and receive information continues to improve and become more efficient. Search engines allow users to provide a few keywords and receive listings of relevant webpages containing content. The size and number of databases available for searching continually increases, thus increasing the complexity of the process of getting desired content to users.
One way in which the WWW provides for a user to interface with a database or set of databases is through forms. Forms are used to provide a user a customized response based on the content of the database and the user's input. The WWW enables an unlimited number of ways to present and govern the user's interaction. Many are investing resources in electronic customer relationship management (e-CRM) to intelligently analyze and improve the user's experience.
However, with the ever increasing demand for e-CRM and e-care, the number of forms on the web has begun to increase dramatically. User-related information, such as name, address, zip code email address, credit card information, data related to personal interests and other types of information or various combinations of data are often required to learn about the user and engage in a dialog. In many scenarios, a user that desires information, such as flight reservations or location direction to an address or entity such as store or building, needs to input information into a form containing input fields in order to access the database containing the information and to receive a response.
In many cases, as an access client like Microsoft's Internet Explorer receives the form-filled information and transmits the information to a web-server, the responsive webpage is a dynamically generated webpage that incorporates the user's input information. In other words, the webpage that is delivered to the client is not a static webpage that contains previously generated content. Dynamically generated webpages often arise when web applications dynamically generates a page that contains information specific to the user's request. Therefore, a webpage delivered in response to a user's providing information in a form related to a travel reservation, or a personal account, etc., is delivered via a dynamically generated webpage. Dynamically-generated webpages are difficult to deal with since they not indexed by search engines and are generated on the fly.
With the increase in the trend of e-CRM and web-enabled access to databases, especially proprietary databases, there is an increasing number of webpages with form interfaces that return dynamically generated pages. Accompanying this increase in e-CRM is a focus on voice-enabled interfaces for various services. One area where voice-enabled services are utilized is in customer services for companies. For example, AT&T's VoiceToneSM service provides a natural, conversational speech interface that listens and responds like a live agent. Callers can simply make a request, ask a question, or even utter a few words and thus avoid time-consuming menus, structured speech and touch-tone prompts. AT&T VoiceToneSM's intelligent intent determination can quickly and accurately understand what callers are trying to accomplish and respond to their precise needs.
One method of interacting via voice with the WWW is via VoiceXML (or VXML). This programming language enables a webpage to be programmed with various voice interactions with a user. There are deficiencies in using VoiceXML, however. The dialog is scripted and must follow the programmed flow. Questions or issues that a user may have outside of the program flow will not be addressed. Further, if a website is updated with new or different information, the VoiceXML code needs to be reprogrammed to accommodate such changes.
There is a need in the art for a system and method that utilizes the benefits and efficiency of voice-enabled interaction to improve a user's interaction with the Internet and various types of databases. There is also a lack of ability to interact with the Internet in the process of filling out a form using a voice-enabled service.